Such a gorgeous book. When you write a wordless book, your illustrations really have to tell the story and capture the readers' imagination. It is a difficult feat, but this is a perfect example of a success. The artwork in this book is amazing and I love the adventurous tale woven through the illustrations. Perfect example of a wonderful wordless book.

I have not read the first book in the series, Journey (Journey Trilogy #1). I saw this at the library and thought it looked interesting. I think you can definitely read this one without having read the first one. You can still understand the story. But I am sure it is a better experience to read them in order. I have already requested the first and third book in the series from the library. Can't wait to read them.

Beautiful book with a fantastic story. I looked through this with one of the little girls I work with and she loved it, especially each time the children escaped their pursuers. Fantastic picture book.

A priest, a mage, a knight, a warrior, a thief, and a giant spider walk into a bar…

Tchaikovsky‘s Clarke Award-winning novel Children of Time (2015) already offered a fascinating glimpse into the arachnid mind – and went a long way to turn me from total arachnophobe into someone who still not really likes, but can at least appreciate spiders from afar. In Spiderlight (2016), the rare beast of a fantasy stand-alone novel, Tchaikovsky returns to eight-legged goodness. Not quite coincidentally, I read it in the same week Doctor Who brought us Spiders in the UK. I mean, what’s more fitting for Halloween than big, hairy, awfully fast spiders?

On first glance, Spiderlight is your typical D&D quest: the aforementioned assembly of rogues, warriors of the Light, follow a prophecy to bring down a Dark Lord. The prophecy leads them to Nth, the giant spider in question, who becomes their unwilling scout. Forcefully turned into a man, or at least into something vaguely resembling a man, he has to learn what it means to be human. The little band is guided by the Light of Armes, some bloke who went to become a god, dividing creation into creatures of the Light – humans – and creatures of the Dark – everyone else - with the Dark’s sole purpose being to be slain by the Light, because Light is better than Dark. Lovely fellow, this Armes, eh?

Tchaikovsky uses this set-up to thoroughly examine and subvert some of the more questionable fantasy tropes. On their journey into the Heart of Darkness our heroes reveal their motives and ever more of their personality - and don't appear all that heroic all of a sudden. Heart and soul of the narrative is Nth, whose abominable treatment poses a few uncomfortable questions about consent, about the means justifying an end, and puts a taint on all that Light.

Of course, subverting tropes has become a trope in itself by now, so the story’s not entirely new. But Tchaikovsky plays it well, tongue firmly in cheek, and with a palpable love for RPG. He manages to hold a fine balance between hilarious and gut-wrenchingly sad, light-hearted and heavy, Light and Dark… (sorry, couldn’t resist). The book’s a real page-turner, to boot. I finished it in just three days.

Recommended, even for people like me, who never quite got the fascination of D&D.

What a fantastic book! It will leave you hungering for your own Alaska adventure. The author is best known for his book chronicling another Alaskan pioneer, Dick Proennecke (One Man's Wilderness). In this book he writes about his own Alaskan obsession, his journey there to work at any job he could find, his hunting and fishing adventures, and the beginning of his friendship with Proennecke. His descriptions of the Alaskan back country, the characters that he meets and works with, his own great relationship with his own family, and his inner feelings, will all leave you feeling that you are there with him! A memoir of a time that is probably lost forever, and of the adventures we might have had if we had only had the courage to follow his lead. Outstanding!

This book is like a class on creativity. What is it, the habits of people who have it. What you can do to get it, increase it, evolve it. As with any class I’ve ever taken there were some very interesting parts and some parts that I completely tuned out. I like to think there were more of the former but don’t ask me for specific examples.

A lot of Questlove’s learning and teachings on the subject obviously were learned from someone who creates music, however, he does explore in to the creativity of writers, chefs and even comedians. I think this book would be beneficial for anyone who is in a creative field but also anyone who is trying to figure out how they can think differently about any subject.

This is one of those books that I think you read, you try to apply it to life then you read again to see how well you interpreted it and if you need to adjust. Or maybe you will get a completely new lesson in the reread.

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